The Damage
by catchingthegirlonfire
Summary: Amy writes an Afterword for the Doctor...but is anything she says true? Did she lead a happy life with Rory...or was letting the angel take her back in time the worst decision she ever made?


"_Don't let him see the damage," _my daughter's words ring out in my head, "_he doesn't like endings."_

But that was him, the Doctor, my Raggedy Man, always turning a blind eye to what he did not want to hear, what he didn't want to know. Never reading the endings, so they ended on his terms. Always. Ancient and forever, shut up in his blue box, locked up tight, almost as closed as his head, his heart.

But somehow I can't blame him. The T.A.R.D.I.S. must be a hell of a lonely place. He let slip once that he had dozens of companions before me, before Rory. Oh Rory. Do I tell him the truth about _him? _About _us?_

No, I couldn't possibly, I'd have to hide it. Bury it deep, couch it in the present, where I know he won't come looking now, for he favors youth, and the _visible lines _in my forehead he so thoughtlessly pointed out to me in New York only grow the deeper.

The lines did not come with age, but stress, for marriage was not as easy as I thought it ought to be. The Doctor came rescuing me when I needed him, giving me a fix for adventure, anywhere, any time, pick a planet, save the universe. But marriage was not the grand adventure I was hoping it was. It was miserable, life-sapping, and the thirst for excitement in me only grows. Once you have a T.A.R.D.I.S. at your fingertips your whole life you can scarcely settle down. I was naive to ever think I could.

I've always loved Rory, him and his stupid face, only growing stupider over time. But I always had an escape, a way out. I should have known, that first night I stepped into the blue box, casting my wedding dress aside, casting him aside. I should have known he was better off without me.

But I couldn't let him go, I was selfish, I wanted everything. How stupid and young I was.

After that things were never same, since the Doctor dropped back into my life. You could cut the tension of our every argument with a knife. Always, in the back of his mind, he thought I'd rather be with the doctor. And as the years went on I was beginning to think he was right.

He always loved me, yes, the perfect husband, doting on the girl filled with fire, so opinionated, so _Scottish. _But over the years his face filled with contempt looking at me. I robbed him of his good normal life, the life he always wanted in Leadworth. He waited 2,000 years to be with me and I was pushing him away. I should have known since the Dream Lord that he never wanted anything else. He would have been perfectly happy working as a Doctor in _Upper _Leadworth, raising a family, with me as the stay at home mum, a role I was never meant to fill.

In some ways I wanted to be a mother, I always did. But when the time came I wasn't ready. I couldn't tell him, I couldn't even tell him I was pregnant. Yet another warning sign. But I didn't think much of it, nor did the Doctor. But Rory always did. And he made to remind me of it at every sign of trouble ever since.

After many years of playing house, as I saw it, we really began to settle down. I have to admit even I was excited for the prospect for a quieter life, to settle down. But as the days turned to weeks, and weeks to years, I became restless, eager for the rush, the thrill, anything to make me feel important to the universe, needed even.

When I saw the open casting call in the shop window I was excited, indescribably excited. I had always wanted to model. They didn't call me _the legs _for nothing. It didn't take much to start my career, but with each passing day Rory grew angry that his dollhouse-style dream was fading from him, fame and fortune taking the forefront.

So I cut him loose when he began to grow sad tied to a barren woman with no hope of giving him children. I thought for once I was making the right decision, for once I was doing what my heart told me, not my head. I loved him, yes, I don't think I'll ever stop loving him. But I loved him so much I finally realized that life with me would be more like a punishment than a dream.

But the Doctor landed back into our lives, sending us back together, much to my initial dismay. And so we continued, Rory and I, with our adult lives. Making friends, going to parties, playing house once again. I can't lie, the veil of modelling that I was hiding behind was a relief to cast away for a while, but the hunger, the vulnerability, the thirst grew back slowly, and every visit by the Doctor was a treat, a fix, something I could hardly go without.

But there I was, staring down an angel, surrounded by my daughter and my hopeless, childish dream, the Doctor. I hardly remember what I said, even now. I had to be with him again, be with Rory again, and I didn't think of anything. The Doctor couldn't save me anymore, I was naked in the dark, with not but myself to go about changing my life.

So there I was transported back in time, to my second hopeless dream, Rory Williams, ready for go three of marriage.

And for a while it worked. Rory became a Doctor and we lived in a great big house, with a big blue door, but nothing could fill the emptiness in my heart or quelch the sadness in his eyes. So we moved, we travelled, we kept busy, we did anything to keep us from drifting apart, but it wasn't working.

We rented an apartment on the Upper West Side, the third floor, so I could look out the window when I wrote. And wrote I did, casting aside Melody Malone, not wanting to publish it, not wanting it to end. River sent me the manuscript many years ago but I haven't gotten around to it. And part of me doesn't want to because then it'd finally be over.

But then it was 1969, the year everything changed. Rory and I took a trip to Florida, to Washington, catching glimpses of our former selves galavanting around the space center, in the chase of an impossible astronaut, never thinking that time in our lives was coming to an end. We had just seen the Doctor die but it felt as though our relationship was dying as well. It left us colder, more distant, and it was becoming clear that we wanted different things.

And so I gave him up again, I ran away one night, in search of one final dream. Melody. Melody Pond. I knew she was there, she had to have been. Roaming the streets, cold and alone, her mind poisoned against the Doctor, ready to regenerate into my best friend Mels. But I never found her. Never got to tell her I love her. Never got to see her again. My baby was torn away from me even then.

When I got back there was little to say to him. We didn't speak for days. It felt like weeks for me. I was used to having him come crawling back to me, but he didn't. He was serious that time.

But it did not pass, and Rory moved out, leaving me an empty apartment, and empty bed, and a great big hole in my heart. He never filed the papers. Never asked for a divorce. But he never saw me again.

Somehow I always knew it would end this way. I saw him in the apartment building in New York, old and alone in his bed. The boy who waited. And I knew that some paradoxes couldn't be broken. I just hope that when that day comes he looks on the young me kindly. For I truly loved him, but I have never deserved him.

So now it's time to fulfill one last obligation to Rory, to the Doctor, to River. She told me to write an Afterword for him, though I don't see how it could do much good.

"Don't let him see the damage," I say to myself poised at my old typewriter.

_Hello old friend, _I type pausing. Old friend? Did that sound strange? What kind of friend dooms someone to live a life in a time that's not their own? Nonetheless, I type on, holding my breath. _And here we are. You and me on the last page. _I exhale, it truly was me and him on the last page. For I have my doubts if Rory would care what I write now. _By the time you read these words Rory and I will be long gone. _And our marriage will be gone as well. _So know that we lived well and were very happy. _I had to keep lying, I just had to. _And above all else know that we will love you always. _

I stop typing a moment, trying to choose my words carefully. _Sometimes I do worry about you, though. I think once we're gone you won't be coming back here for a while… _the thought trails off. Of course he wasn't coming back for me or Rory. We're old now. And the Doctor hates endings. ..._and you might be alone which you should never be. _The Doctor always has needed someone to take care of him, ground him. _Don't be alone Doctor. And do one more thing for me. There's a little girl waiting in a garden. She's going to wait a long while, so she's going to need a lot of hope. Go to her. Tell her a story. _If he won't come to me, maybe he'll go to her, little Amelia scared of the crack in her wall.

_Tell her that if she's patient, the days are coming that she'll never forget. _Days that she couldn't forget. Not even to save her own marriage. _Tell her she'll go to sea and fight pirates. She'll fall in love with a man who'll wait two thousand years to keep her safe. _And then destroy their marriage. _Tell her she'll give hope to the greatest painter who ever lived and save a whale in outer space. Tell her this is the story of Amelia Pond. And this how it ends._

That's it. It's done. Though somehow it looks unfinished. I study it for a moment and with a sigh I write on, _Raggedy Man, goodnight. _No, that doesn't work.

I rip the paper out of the typewriter and cross it out, thinking better of it, for the doctor doesn't often sleep, for he fear changes, dreams, and other things he can't control.

"You better read this," I hiss under my breath giving it a final once-over, "Because I hate endings too."

* * *

><p>This story was based off of a post I saw online wondering if Amy's words were all lies to appease the Doctor. I sort of toyed with the idea of going further than that to see if we could cast some doubt on the state of their marriage.<p>

I personally would like to think they ended up finding eachother and that they were happy...but who knows! This could've been their end!


End file.
